5/28/2020 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly accused, nevertheless engaged in recruitment activities, offering and promising jobs to private complainants and collecting from them various amounts as placement fees. This is substantiated by the respective testimonies of the three private complainants who fell victim to their illegal activities. Marcelo de Guzman testified that appellant was physically present during the time that he and his companions were being shown job orders and while he was paying for the fees for himself and in behalf of his companions. Francisco Poserio testified that appellant was one of those who apprised him of job benefits and tried to convince him to apply for overseas employment through their agency. Gina Decena mentioned that [appellant] even gave her a copy of the job order. We find no cogent reason to disturb the findings of the lower court that there was conspiracy among the accused in the commission of the offense. Direct proof of previous agreement to commit a crime is not necessary. It may be deduced from the mode and manner in which the offense was perpetrated, or inferred from the acts of the accused which point to a joint purpose and design, concerted action and community of interest. Conspiracy exists where the participants performed specific acts with such closeness and coordination as unmistakably to indicate a common purpose or design in committing the crime. The testimonies of the complainants on the matter are affirmative in nature and sufficiently corroborative of each other to be less than credible. It would be contrary to human nature and experience for several persons to conspire and accuse appellant of a crime and send him to prison just to appease their feeling of rejection and vindicate the frustration of their dreams to work abroad if all he did was just to reside in the same apartment where his mother-in-law [Daud] operated her recruitment agency. It is in this light that We find any inconsistencies that accused-appellant harps on in the tesimonines of the complainants to be inconsequential. What is important is that they have positively identified accused-appellant as one of those who enticed them to part with their money in exchange for promised jobs abroad. The crime of illegal recruitment, according to the Supreme Court is committed when, among other things, a person, who without being duly authorized according to law, represents or gives the distinct impression that he or she has the power or the ability to provide work abroad convincing those to whom the representation is made or to whom the impression is given to thereupon part with their money in order to be assured of that employment. This is what obtains in this case. Contrary to appellant’s mistaken notion, it is not the issuance or signing of receipts for the placement fees that makes a case for illegal recruitment, but rather the undertaking of recruitment activities without the necessary license or authority. The absence of receipts to evidence payment is not necessarily fatal to the prosecution’s cause. A person charged with the illegal recruitment may be convicted on the strength of the testimony of the elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/57079 11/19